A Ukrainian artillery strike has killed at least three people at a market in the city of Donetsk, the capital of Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic, Governor Denis Pushilin reported on Wednesday.
Ukrainian forces used 155mm shells to strike the Sokol market in the city’s Kirov neighborhood, the official stated. Two men and one woman were killed, he said initially, later clarifying that two of the victims were actually teenagers, a girl and a boy. Ten people were injured in the incident, including another child, Pushilin said.
There were several other incidents in the region, including a drone bombing in a rural area in which a young woman was injured, Pushilin added.
Some media outlets have suggested that the weapon used in the attack was a French Caesar howitzer. Footage from the scene shows trade pavilions and a car apparently riddled with shrapnel.
On Tuesday, the Ukrainian military suffered a significant blow when a Russian missile strike hit a training center in the city of Poltava. Scores of troops were killed and injured in what the country’s leader, Vladimir Zelensky, described as an attack on “an educational facility.” The Russian military claimed that the facility housed foreign instructors who trained Ukrainians in military communications, electronic warfare, and drone operations.
Donetsk has been suffering from Ukrainian attacks since 2014, when its people rejected the government in Kiev that was installed following a US-backed armed coup. The new authorities unsuccessfully tried to quash the rebellion by military force, resulting in a frozen conflict.
The hostilities between Russia and Ukraine started in 2022. Moscow accused Kiev of stonewalling a negotiated roadmap for reintegrating Donbass and preparing a new military assault instead. People in what was at the time the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic voted in a referendum to join Russia in September of that year, along with the Lugansk People’s Republic.
Over the past several months, Russian forces have been pushing Ukrainian troops from their fortified positions in Donbass.